GCn20

Benevides & Higgins... you would still need to ask permission to BC & MTL. Of course they'd say yes, but they still have contracts so it's part of the process. I like the idea of bringing back LaPo. I'm sure he'd be open to it too, knowing O'Shea will have a short leash, and no one from the Mack era that rushed him out there door is left! No, you do not need permission from b.c. or montreal to talk to higgins or benevides. IF...you hire them then the stipulations as to a payout - if that has not happened already, comes into effect. But they are fired...anyone can call them with inquires... Benevides - no. Higgins - yes. Higgins is still under contract to Montreal so they would have to give their permission to talk to him (unless his contract has already been bought out by the Als). Both Higgins and Benevides have accepted buyouts for the remainder of their contracts. Benevides was fired before his extension kicked in so he wouldn't have had to be bought out. They still paid him an undisclosed sum even though his extension had not kicked in. Good will I guess.

Absolutely, scouting has been dreadful. We have turned up a few decent players in the last couple years but have not been finding much in the way of impact players. Mo Leggett and K.Bass are the types of recruits we need. Sadly they are the only two worth mentioning from this group of recruiters.

I want most of the players back as well. Sadly, it's only because I lack faith in our recruitment to even find suitable replacements for average/below average players. If I could be "guaranteed" that I could replace what needs replacing on the roster with an upgrade to at least average, I could find about 8-10 players in need of replacement. Is that my roundabout way of saying I think we have 8-10 players that are below average on our team. Yep, you bet. More if I count some young guys that I am not counting in this because I am willing to give them the time to develop. I do think we have a pretty solid core group of players, however, there are some roster holes big enough for even our RBs to run through. If we are to have any hope of contending in the near future the following players must be replaced with upgrades imo: QB - Brian Brohm RB - Cam Marshall, Paris Cotton WR- Rory Kohlert SB- JFG LG/RG - Pat Neufeld, Matthias Goosen DE - PEACH ( for the love of GOD replace PEACH) DT - Z.Anderson MLB - Sam Hurl S - LinJ Shell K - Lirim Hajrallahu Others must take big step forwards coming out of rookie and sophomore year such as Waggoner, Briggs etc.

I have no issues with Westerman playing right up until the whistle blows or even shortly after. This hit turned out badly because he stumbled and fell. I don't buy the intent to injure crap. He was doing his job and it turned into a dangerous play because he lost his balance. I still want all his momentum going straight towards the QB at all times....even if it means an occasional fine. I'm not going to sit here and cry for the QBs of the CFL getting hit and sometimes hit dirty....and if there ever was a fanbase who had the right to do so over the past few years, it's us.

Benevides & Higgins... you would still need to ask permission to BC & MTL. Of course they'd say yes, but they still have contracts so it's part of the process. I like the idea of bringing back LaPo. I'm sure he'd be open to it too, knowing O'Shea will have a short leash, and no one from the Mack era that rushed him out there door is left! No, you do not need permission from b.c. or montreal to talk to higgins or benevides. IF...you hire them then the stipulations as to a payout - if that has not happened already, comes into effect. But they are fired...anyone can call them with inquires... Benevides - no. Higgins - yes. Higgins is still under contract to Montreal so they would have to give their permission to talk to him (unless his contract has already been bought out by the Als). Both Higgins and Benevides have accepted buyouts for the remainder of their contracts.

All this crap about tampering, and we have no idea if the guy Miller was talking to is currently under contract. Miller can talk to anyone that is not employed right now, and there are some excellent assistant candidates currently out of work. For all we know he was talking to Mike Benevides, or Tom Higgins, or Paul Lapolice, etc. etc etc. This tampering talk is just pure unfounded speculation. Nowhere does it say he was talking to people currently under contract and unless he is the world's worst tamperer I don't for one minute believe that he was.

Don't contact any team during the season. The season is over in a week. If it's a playoff team wait until they're eliminated or win the Grey Cup. Play by the rules & at least have integrity. Like I said, how would we like it if the roles were reversed? As fans we would be upset. What goes around, comes around. If you think that this sort of stuff doesn't go on all the time in this league, you are very naive. And you are.... what GM??? You have no clue if it does or doesn't. You just think it does. I'm not a GM, but I am a fan of deductive reasoning. The fact that contracts can be announced within minutes of someone going to free agency tells me that clearly, the details of the contract had to have been worked out before hand. The fact that tampering brings a whopping fine of $5000 tells me that the league isn't too concerned about it. The CFL is a joke when it comes to fines, I admit that. It still doesn't make it right & like I said, we have nothing to be proud of as fans when it comes to the onfield performance of the team. I hoped we could be proud that we still retained integrity... This could have waited. Blah...blah..blah...aren't you on a high horse right now. Get off the cross Moses. Just another swipe at your "favorite" team is all this is about. If you are really this disheartened by every action of the Bombers then why don't you just run along to GoStampsGo or whatever the current forum incarnation with 2 members is in Calgary, and talk with Childress about the Stamps. That oughtta cheer you up.

Good call. It's not like O'Shea and the Bombers have another game on the schedule to prepare for. Yup, because we're in playoff mode. Are you suggesting we should throw in the towel?

I sure hope this isn't Miller trying to get a headstart on hiring coordinators so that he can pull a Jim Popp and put himself in the HCing position. LOL.

Read the article...it's an assistant currently under contract with a team. The anonymous source is pissed off at Miller. That is just plain false.I think you should re-read the article. Nowhere does it state that it's a coach that is currently under contract and nowhere does it say or even imply that anyone is pissed off at Miller.

I think it is highly unlikely that Miller is speaking to anyone currently under contract. He might be talking to people that are currently unemployed or may have requested permission to speak to Dyce or Chapdelaine, since their futures are in the air. But I HIGHLY doubt that he is talking to anyone that is currently under contract without permission, and I even more HIGHLY doubt that permission would be granted. I don't for one minute think that he is doing whatever he is doing behind O'Shea's back either. I strongly believe that MOS has given him a list of names he would be interested in interviewing for OC and would like Wade to let know of the interest. Obviously, MOS cannot do this during the season while he is chasing a playoff spot and he has to work with MB for the time being.

I expect consequences for this debacle of a season. If I'm Wade Miller, I fire Danny McManus and lure a top notch scout away from another team. I, aslo, hire a Tom Higgins type of guy as a director of player personnel and hold Walters feet to the flame. Put him on notice that he better do better. I don't fire Walters or O'Shea but make sure I have people at the ready to take over. If I'm Walters, I talk to O'Shea and demand the firing of MB and let him know his replacement must come with his approval and had better be a good one. I find a blue chipper scout and either add him on or replace McManus/Goveia. I let a lot of our pending non NI FA's walk and sign Andrew Harris and OL help. I sign Bilikudi and dump Hurl. I make every effort to re-sign Matt Nichols or another experienced backup. If I'm O'Shea, I turf the entire offensive coaching staff. They suck. I get a top notch ST coordinator as well.as a QB coach for Willy and Nichols. Nichols, seemed to have trouble getting into a groove early in ball games and I think that was mostly mental on his part. A good QB coach may have been of great assistance. I, also, walk into Walters office and demand that he sign a gamebreaker on offence. We simply have no one that the opposing defence needs to fear. We need that type of player that changes how opposing defences would like to play against you, into how they have to play against you. We don't have that. We need it desperately. Andrew Harris immediately comes to mind. He keeps opposing defences on their heels. This, of course, is just a preliminary list but it's where I'd start, I don't believe that firing Walters or O'Shea lends any credibility to our team at all and is something we should try to avoid. Not saying they don't deserve a good public rebuke or that the organization shouldn't put in a first class exit strategy in place for their future dismissal. However, I believe we should stay the course with improvements made of course. We simply cannot continue to be the organization that continues to hire and fire every second year. That could cost us far more then keeping these guys on. We must show stability for once in the past decade or we immediately revert back to being a joke again. We can avoid that. The problems of our current coaching and management are not insurmountable, they just need more of and a better supporting cast....much like the core group of players that we will keep.

Russ Michna. We have decided to go full circle. JK...lol

He started in Calgary as a scout in '06.

Not true. Hufnagel inherited one of the best talent recruiters in the game in John Murphy who was actually hired by Jim Barker. Don't get me wrong, Huffer has done a great job with the Stamps but Barker had built an excellent football scouting department that Huf largely left intact. I should also mention that salary cap guru Michael Petrie, and one of the best Canadian scouts in the game Brendan Mahoney were also inherited by Huffer from the Barker days. John built an excellent coaching staff, but his front office was basically turn key. There is this huge myth that Hufnagel built the Stamps front office, not true at all. All key players were in place when he got there. He was simply smart enough to retain them.

I couldn't care less if these guys lasted 2 days and were released and we brought in new ones. It doesn't make bringing them in a waste of time or a recruitment failure. Just the opposite really. A recruitment failure would be hanging onto or bringing in substandard players and then letting them battle in TC next year knowing that they are realistically not good enough for the CFL. We have seen too much of that over the past couple of years. Let's separate the wheat from the chaff right now when our PR is expanded.

Luba did not sing 99 red balloons. That would be a German artist names Nena....hence the German singing.

They lead the league in close losses not moral victories. There isn't a single loss this season for the Riders that, in my estimation, they outplayed or played on par with the opposition but came out on the wrong side of the scoreboard. Their close losses were never in doubt because in nearly every game that was close the opposition managed to leave a lot of points they should have had on the table. Unlike our two games where we were evenly matched against the Stampeders and outplayed the Eskies, the Rider games were close only in score. If a person didn't tally the score all game in the Riders games and based the win/loss solely on which team was more dominant the Riders would still have the same record this year whereas we have at least two to three losses this year where we were very evenly matched or dominant in the game and just had a bad break here or there.

Those were a couple of real bad defences last night.

No one was going to win with Brohm/Marve. Full stop. However, a guy like Nichols could probably be .500 with us if we had reasonable offensive coaching. I think our HCing is fine and that Hall has done a good job with the D. Our biggest flaws this year has been with the offensive play calling and system and with highly suspect ST play. I think our team has played well and been well prepared for all games this year with the exception of the Hamilton game. That indicates to me that MOS has not lost the room and is capable of motivating our team but needs better ST and O coordinators.

I think people would like that elusive 4th impact import receiver so that there would be no justification for dressing a Bastien or a JFG.

Name a veteran coach who isn't 70 who would come here. No to Higgins. There isn't oneGary Crowton is available. Casey Creehan. As head coaches?! They were borderline competent as coordinators. I would like to believe he was joking because neither of these guys even approach competency as coordinators.

I have no problem with the fact we signed him. I have trouble with the fact we dressed him and played him.

Jeebus.....Lawrence is fast. 10.27/100....that's world class sprinter speed. He would probably be the fastest guy in the CFL in a straight line.

I would love to have either player on my team. However, both men have boat anchors for contracts so no thank you. Chick and Owens may be good players but both are making 200k or over a season. That is not good player import money, that is elite level import money, and I don't believe that either of them is elite in this league anymore. Certainly not Chick anyway. He is grossly overpaid. An argument could be made for Owens making that much since he is a dual threat player but his production has declined over the past season and a half. Essentially the proposed trade would net us Chick and Owens, lose us Denmark and Wild and 1-2 other good/solid players for cap reasons. Sorry...not worth it.